We knew Adarsh report will be rejected: Justice Patil

Mumbai: Justice (retd) JA Patil, who probed the Adarsh housing society scam, on Monday said he knew Maharashtra government would reject the report as it had indicted four former chief ministers and many bureaucrats and its findings were "unpalatable" to government.

The Democratic Front government of Congress and NCP combine rejected the probe report after tabling it before the state Assembly on the last day of the winter session of state legislature on December 20, causing a furore.

"We have a clear idea in our mind of what happened (referring to the Adarsh scam). Based on that we submitted our report after recording the evidence of several witnesses and perusing relevant documents.

The findings were not palatable to the government and hence it must have been rejected," Patil said.
The report names former Congress chief ministers, Ashok Chavan, Sushilkumar Shinde and late Vilasrao Deshmukh. It also indicted Shivajirao Nilangekar Patil, who served as Revenue Minister when the building received clearances. Patil had also served as chief minister in the 1980s.

The retired judge of the Bombay High Court said the government`s decision should have been in the larger public interest.

"I agree that a commission is not a judicial body and our orders are not enforceable or has any legal sanctity. We are just a fact-finding body and the government has the discretion to accept or reject our findings. But it should not be arbitrary. The decision (of the government) should be in public interest," he said.
Patil said that an amendment should be made in the Commission of Inquiry Act giving findings of a commission some legal sanctity.

The panel, headed by Patil, and comprising former bureaucrat P Subramaniam, was set up in January 2011 by the state government after allegations were levelled against bureaucrats and former chief ministers for acts of commission and omission and for flouting rules while granting permission to the high-rise in south Mumbai.